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View Full Version : Post your potty training experiences/tips here



vikivoly
03-14-2005, 04:48 PM
I think there is no one thing that works for all kids as far as potty training goes. I've done some research through the past threads and have been pulling bits and pieces from each post and customizing our own potty training method. I thought it would be nice if those of you who have successfully PTd your toddler, would post your stories all in one thread.

What worked?
What didn't?
What age did you start?
What age did you succeed?
How long from start to finish until you're child was successfully peeing & pooping in the potty?
Tips for pooping.
Tips for nighttime/naptime training.
Tips for out and about.
Do you have a boy or a girl?

Anything else you can offer. Please tell us your story!

hjdong
03-14-2005, 05:49 PM
O.k. Let's see. DS started "playing" with pottying at about 19 months (disclaimer: he was adopted at 19 months from China which does infant potty training, so technically I guess we started playing with potty training then). We would sit him on the potty before bath and he would pee.

He would sometimes pee, sometimes poop, and sometimes neither for quite a long time. None of us took it very seriously from then until about 2 1/2. At one point, I started to take it more seriously (after pressure from ILs - shortly after 2nd birthday) but he stressed out so I backed off.

Shortly after 2 1/2, I got him cloth training pants, and in two weeks, he was pee trained. Except, strangely, for naptime. He used to not have accidents at naptime, now he does. For the moment, I don't really care. I figure, when he gives up naps, he'll give up accidents at nap.

Pooping was more of an issue. What finally worked was M&Ms. I SWORE up and down I would NEVER use M&Ms. As it turns out, there's a reason for the M&M method. Apparently, people have found it works. DH jokes that DS now finds a way to push out the smallest amount of poop. I would guess it was about a month after pee training that we finished with the poop training (although it felt like forever - he would hold it until nap and/or bedtime and get horrible rashes).

I personally have found DS more likely to have an accident at home than out and about. Going out in "big boy" pants the first few times was a big, scary deal (for me), but I've gotten used to it. Take him to stores the first few times. Your anonymous at a store. A friend will remember an accident at there house.

Since I'm nowhere near nightime or nap training, I can't help there. Truthfully, I'm not even worried about it yet.

Edited to add: We went back and forth between inserts, potty seats, and just the big potty. Out now he uses just the big potty, at home, he uses an insert and a stepstool. I recommend having different choices; DS likes to go back and forth.

Good luck,

vikivoly
04-09-2005, 12:24 AM
Well, I guess I can officially post our story now. :)

DD showed very little interest in the potty, but we had it out for her to just sit on (first clothed and then naked) since she was about 22 months. She was peeing either in the tub or just before getting in the tub, so we started putting her on the potty at bathtime. After about 4 months of that she finally peed. We of course made a huge deal. The next evening we put her on again before bathtime and she peed again. Each day we started putting her on the potty more and more and she was peeing at least 2-3 times per day. For incentive we used the Pampers Kandoo Passport with stickers. We received it unsolicited in the mail and made a big deal about calling it a passport - sounded more official and special than a sticker book.

We soon switched her over to pull-ups - again making sure not to call them diapers. They were pull-ups - very special ;). I bought her the boys Huggies with Toy Story characters, since that's her thing right now. They have the designs that disappear when she pees. I also used the Pamper's Feel & Learn pull-ups. They're much softer and also have the disappearing design, but they are supposed to let them feel the wetness. Honestly, she wasn't bothered by it when she was wet.

We tried big girl panties about 1 1/2 weeks into it, but it was a disaster. She was still having 2-3 accidents a day and it caused her Eczema to flare up, so we switched back to the pull-ups. She didn't have any interest in wearing the big girl panties either.

I took her potty about every 1/2 hour the first few days and about every hour the next week or two. Eventually, within a week, she was occassionally telling me when she had to go. She mostly went willingly, but sometimes she did object. I never her forced her on the potty though. She would often object up to the point of going into the bathroom and then once she was in there would be fine and pull her pants down.

The transition from potty to toilet was smooth. Her first success on the toilet was at the mall, I was very shocked, since she had to bear her wait without an insert. As the days passed she was having less and less accidents, with a dry day here and there. This week she has not had any accidents while awake. (Although I do suspect she is peeing in her pull-up just after she wakes, but before I go into to get her out of bed.) Yesterday I put her in cloth training pants from Gerber and this evening she was in big girl panties.

I got her to poop on the potty by catching her "in the act". I would take her while she was pooping and sit her on the potty. The first two times she was already finished, but I still sat her on the potty and took the poop from her pull-up and put it in the toilet and showed her that's where it belongs. The 3rd time (this may be TMI) she had a bit still 'hanging' from her bottom, so when I sat her down I made her wiggle it off. (A cute sidenote, I told her to pinch her butt cheeks together and she pinched her face cheeks with her fingers. :)) When she successfully got the poop off of her and into the potty she was amazed and thought she had done the real thing. The next time she started grunting I tooked her immediately to the potty, but nothing happened. She told me 3-4 times within an hours time span that she had to go potty and then wouldn't do anything. Finally, she asked again and successfully pooped in the potty. Since then, she has asked to go potty everytime she had to poop. She does ask to go a few times before it eventually comes out though.

I would guess the entire process (from her first pee in the potty until now) took less than a month. She is now 28 months old. She's still peeing during naps and at night and I haven't made a big deal about it. She acts disappointed each morning because she peed on Buzz (Lightyear), but I usually tell her it's ok because she was sleeping.

Thus far, we haven't done out and about without pull-ups, but she's actually not had any accidents when we are on the go and goes easily in a public restroom. My concern is if I have her in panties when we're out, what if she falls asleep in the carseat - which she often does.?

Hope this helps someone and I hope to see this thread keep going.

christic
04-12-2005, 01:17 PM
I have to say this is one area where mommy laziness really paid off, big time. Alice just turned 3 and I've been holding off on jumping into this seriously for a long time, mostly because the thought of finding places for her to go potty out and about seemed so overwhelming and so much harder than just changing diapers. But we finally did it last week and it was much easier than expected--so glad we waited.

Mostly used the book Potty Training in Less than a Day, although did it differently than they recommend to make it less intense. So about 4 months ago we did a "day" of training pretty much as they lay out, but skipped most of the doll stuff. We've had the potty around for over a year so she at least knew how it was supposed to work. We didn't do the running back and forth to the potty 10 times after an accident either--did it a few times but only as long as I could keep it fun. After that day we maybe could have switched right into panties, but I was too exhausted from it all! and she just didn't seem completely ready either so I backed off. Occasionally she'd ask to wear panties but I waited until just after her 3rd birthday to try to make the big switch. She took to it instantly and after a long weekend she's got daytime down. Can't believe it really.

Haven't made any attempt at nights!

The only thing I can say definitely didn't work for us were pull-ups. She would only keep them dry after an accident in real underwear. We use them for nights now but otherwise I found them expensive and useless!

Tips for pooping? Hope this isn't TMI but the big incentive for her to poop in the potty was telling her she could look at it afterwards, yucky but it worked.

Hardest part was talking her back into underwear after an accident since they freak her out. They freaked me out at first too, and we're yet to have the big major one out and about, but it was the accidents (and talking her through them) that was the biggest learning tool of all.

Hope some of this might help! I learned a lot here searching the archives too.

Chris